Wednesday, December 18, 2002

My 11-year-old's fifth grade science teacher sent home this little evaluation regarding his in-class report [that] found his topic of guns objectionable. I fired right back at her about the school's DARE instructor. This is a desk-bound deputy who comes into the classrooms a few times a week with a loaded Glock 21, a high-capacity .45 caliber pistol, to "instruct" our kids.

This person then proceeded to remove her loaded gun from the holster, and then remove the magazine from the still loaded weapon right in front of the class to show the kids.

I am infuriated over this. I've asked the Sheriff's Department in the past to refrain from allowing their deputies to strut around inside our schools with loaded weapons, but it apparently falls on deaf ears. This is not the first person on the sheriff's staff to do this, as I've witnessed it many times before by a good number of his staff.

Most of the sheriff's staff that do these little presentations are, in my opinion, far from competent and are quite likely to shoot themselves in the foot before they'd ever have any constructive use of their firearms. Instead, they place our children in distinct danger by wearing, showing, and handling loaded weapons in our classrooms.

Our public schools, especially elementary grades, are no place for loaded firearms. Period. As a certified firearms instructor, I find this flippant practice of Fayette County deputies goes totally unchecked by our sheriff.

His staff is uniquely known for their pompous and arrogant displays of their lofty positions, and they are apparently accountable for nothing and to no one. These "office types" give the hard-working street deputies within the very same department an awful name.

But unlike their ranking peers who flaunt their weapons in front of Fayette County's 8- and 9-year-olds, they instead risk their lives daily to provide Fayette County citizens with a comforting level of protection. And you can bet the regular street officer has a much different attitude toward his firearm and the damage they are quite capable of causing.

To make matters worse, the teachers then scold the elementary kids for even speaking about guns in any manner, even as the DARE officer has just left the building patting her loaded firearm. This hypocritical [stuff] has got to go. [Sheriff] Randall Johnson's lack of control of his immediate staff has me pretty well [angered].

Greg Baxter

Fayetteville